The five-dollar bill felt damp in Avery's hand as she completed the water purchase at the convenience store. Jax's abrupt exit had left a strange hollowness, a vacuum where a familiar, albeit complicated, presence had been. She tucked the change into her purse and stepped out into the twilight, the thick California air thick and heavy around her. Her parents' house was only a few blocks away, a beacon of familiarity in a town that felt both intimately known and subtly different after her ten-year absence.

The quiet walk was a welcome balm, a chance to untangle the knot of emotions that Jax's reappearance had tightened in her chest. Charming, a place with a modest population, wasn't a place where anonymity thrived. She had always known their paths would cross eventually, the threads of their shared history too tightly woven to remain separate indefinitely. Yet, she had envisioned a gentler re-entry, a slow easing back into the rhythms of her past before facing the ghost of it head-on. The universe, it seemed, had a different, more immediate plan.

Ten years.

A decade.

So much life lived in the interim, miles and experiences stretching between the girl who had left and the woman who had returned. And of all the faces she might have encountered on her first night back, it had to be his. A wry smile touched her lips at the sheer predictability of it all. Some things, apparently, never changed.

Her childhood home, a two-story white colonial with faded blue shutters, grew larger with each step. The porch swing where she had spent countless summer afternoons with her best friend, Sarah, was still there. She could almost hear their teenage laughter echoing in the stillness. The scent of honeysuckle, always strongest in the evening air, filled her nostrils, a powerful trigger for a flood of memories – scraped knees, firefly jars, whispered secrets under starry skies. Lost in the reverie of the past, her feet moved on autopilot. Avery stepped onto the porch, the old wooden steps groaning beneath her. Almost instinctively, her hand grasped the cool brass of the doorknob. A soft turn and click, and she was enveloped by the familiar smells of her mother's pot roast and the low hum of her father's TV, a comforting warmth surrounding her as she entered.

"Mom, I'm home!" she called out, placing her purse on the cherry console in the entryway.

"Avey? Is that you?"

"Yes mom!" Avery yelled back. "Where are you?"

"In the kitchen!"

"Hey mom."

"I can't believe you are home baby." Said Paige Mitchell as she enveloped her daughter in a tight embrace.

"It's good to be back." Said Avery when her mom finally released her. "Where's dad? Think he would mind if I use the truck to go get my bags? I left them at the office"

"I don't think he'll mind at all. He's out in the garage tinkering on that mower again. I don't know why he doesn't just buy a new one. That thing has given him nothing but problems this year." Said Paige as she went back to the stove.

"You know he loves to work on things."

"Yeah well, if he keeps putting money into that dilapidated antique he calls a mower, he will have spent enough to buy a new one." Paige said laughing. "Anyway, keys are on the hook by the door. Go get your bags but come straight back. Dinner is almost done."

"Okay, I'll be right back."

******

As she drove over to her new office, Avery's thoughts returned to Jax. She remained curious about his abrupt departure. She wondered if the fire had SAMCRO connections, perhaps affecting someone close to the club or even being near Jax's residence.

Avery was so lost in her thoughts that she hadn't realized she was driving by TM until the whirl of air wrenches pulled her from her thoughts. Glancing over to the garage, she didn't see any bikes on the lot. Not that she expected them to be since she had a sinking suspicion that the fire from earlier was somehow connected to SAMCRO.

Even before leaving for law school. Avery knew the type of things that the club was getting into. It was part of the reason that she'd wanted Jax to get out of Charming and come with her to North Carolina.

Knowing that she couldn't change the past, she gave one last lingering look at T.M. before heading over to her office. Within minutes, her belongings were tossed into the bed of the truck and she was on the way back to her childhood home, the promise of her mom's pot roast making her stomach growl.

*****

Later that night as she was laying in the same bed she'd had as a teenager, Avery thought not for the first time about her parents hadn't changed a single thing in her room. The room was like a damn time capsule. Even the sheets and comforter on the bed were the same lime green and purple tie dye they had been in high school. And then the memories started to flood her, just as she knew they would.

Memories of her and Jax's first time together.

Memories of Jax telling her he loved her for the first time.

Memories of all their talks about the future.

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"How many kids do you want Jax?"

"As many saw you want to have with me" replied Jax as he held me tightly against him after our first time.

"That's not exactly an answer."

"Two or three would be fine by me. If we have more, so be it."

"I can see it now. A little boy with your blond hair. God help us when he gets older and starts dating. We'll have to beat the girls off of him with baseball bats."

"And what if they have your dark hair?"

"As long as they look like you, they're still going to be heartbreakers."

"Oh, flattery will get you everywhere baby."

"Good to know. But it's not flattery when you're just speaking the truth. I love you with my whole fucking heart, Avery Leigh Mitchell. I know I'm not a member yet, but would you get my crow tattooed on you so that everyone knows you belong to me?

"What will the club say about you marking me with your crow and you aren't a member yet?"

"Baby, you and I both know that I will be a patched member before the end of the year. I'm already prospecting. Plus, who's going to tell the president's son that he can't do that? Definitely not Dad."

"In that case, I guess we better figure out when I'm getting inked."

💭💭💭💭💭💭💭💭💭💭💭

Unconsciously, Avery ran her hand down the left side of her body where Jax's crow was on her rib cage. One wing of the crow ended just on the underside of her breast while the other stretched around to her back.

Traditionally, an "Old Lady" would get her man's tattoo in a visible place to signify ownership. However, Avery wanted Jax's crow tattoo hidden due to her desired career. While she wanted to show her commitment to him, she felt a visible tattoo would be unprofessional for someone approaching the bench.Jax hadn't argued since all that mattered to him was that she was his.

The harsh red numbers of the digital clock glared 1:58 AM. Avery sighed, the familiar weight of sleeplessness pressing down on her. She had been tossing and turning for what felt like hours, the silence of the night amplifying the restless energy thrumming within her. Finally admitting defeat, she pushed the tangled duvet aside and swung her legs over the edge of the bed. The cool wooden floor felt comforting beneath her bare feet as she made her way out of the darkened bedroom. In the hallway, a sliver of moonlight painted a pale rectangle on the worn rug. She navigated towards the spare room, the repository of forgotten memories. Inside, dusty boxes overflowed with photographs and faded yearbooks, silent witnesses to years gone by. She selected a heavy, cloth-bound album from a shelf, its pages thick with the ghosts of smiles and laughter. Settling into the armchair by the window, the moonlight illuminating the yellowed pages, Avery began to turn them, each photograph a tiny portal back to a different time.

When she was done with the yearbooks, she moved on to photo albums. On the very first page of the first album was a picture from Avery and Jax's homecoming dance their freshman year. Avery remembered that night like it was yesterday.

Despite their starkly different social orbits within Northwood High, Avery and Jax found their paths unexpectedly converging. Avery, with her effortless popularity and a calendar perpetually filled with social engagements, moved through the crowded hallways like royalty. Jax, on the other hand, cultivated an air of rebellious detachment, a self-proclaimed bad boy whose reputation often preceded him, leaving a ripple of whispers in his wake. Yet, to the surprise of many, and perhaps even themselves, both Avery and Jax found their names on the ballot to represent the freshman class at Homecoming.

Avery initially felt uneasy about working with Jax due to rumors linking his father to a suspicious local club. These whispers created a negative perception of Jax and made her apprehensive about collaborating with him. However, that night marked the beginning of an intense romance, one that neither Jax not Avery could have ever dreamed of. Avery discovered that Jax's "bad boy" image was a facade while Jax learned that just because Avery was one of the most popular girls in the school, she wasn't a 'mean girl'. Avery learned that beneath the tough exterior lay a kindhearted person, a boy who was well on the way to adulthood, a boy with an old soul and an analytical mind. She learned that the rumors of him being a womanizer were also false, a deliberate act to maintain his rebellious persona.

Flipping through the worn pages of the old photo album, Avery let out a soft sigh, a nostalgic ache blooming in her chest. "We were just babies back then," she murmured, her fingers tracing the faded outline of a younger version of herself. The album was a tangible record of a shared past, its brittle pages filled with countless images of her and Jax. Each photograph was a tiny portal, transporting her back to a time of youthful innocence and burgeoning emotions. There they were, frozen in moments of laughter and awkward poses, their smiles wide and unburdened by the complexities of adulthood. They appeared in every frame as typical teenagers, navigating the rollercoaster of high school life, grappling with first loves, and experiencing the intensity of teenage feelings. There was the awkward school dance photo, Jax's hand hovering uncertainly above her waist, their braces-filled grins mirroring each other. Another captured a sun-drenched beach day, their faces smeared with sunscreen, their eyes sparkling with the carefree joy of summer. There was the snapshot from her sixteenth birthday party, Jax standing slightly behind her, a shy smile playing on his lips as she blew out the candles. Each image told a silent story, a testament to a bond forged in shared experiences and the simple purity of youth.